Extreme-left Professor Ze'ev Sternhell faces incitement charges after calling Jewish towns in Judea and Samaria a threat. The Land of Israel Task Force announced Thursday that it had filed a request with Attorney General Menachem Mazuz asking him to investigate Sternhell for incitement to racism, incitement to violence, and slander against a community.
Task Force Attorney Aviad Visoly explained that the allegations stemmed from an interview Sternhell gave to the Hebrew daily Yediot Aharonot. In the interview, Sternhell discussed Jewish residents of Judea and Samaria, saying, “I think they are a disaster, and I think their worldview is a recipe for the destruction of the Jewish state. In my eyes the settlements are the greatest threat to the state of Israel's future.”
Sternhell also said, “The rule of law has collapsed in the territories [Judea and Samaria—ed.]. That must be broken, we must enforce the law in the settlements.”
Sternhell's statements encourage hatred and negative feelings towards members of a community simply because they are Jews living in a particular area, Visoly said. In addition, his call to “break” resistance constitutes incitement to violence, he said.
Finally, Visoly said, while Sternhell was the recent victim of a bomb attack on his home, he must be treated like any other victim and not allowed to incite to racism or violence. Any attempt to assign collective blame for the attack on over 300,000 Jews living in Judea and Samaria, as Sternhell has done, constitutes incitement—particularly in the absence of proof that the attack was carried out by Jewish nationalists.